*5.3.3. Lacazia loboi*

The yeast-like, dimorphic fungus, *Lacazia loboi* (formerly known as *Laboa loboi*) causes invasive cutaneous lesions in dolphins and humans [58], known as lobomycosis, lacaziosis or keloidal blastomycosis [41, 59, 62]. The first case of keloidal blastomycosis was described in 1931 in a human patient from the Amazon valley [63]. This disease was only known to affect humans until 1971, when Migaki and co-workers described a case of lobomycosis in an Atlantic bottlenose dolphin [64]. In 1973, De Vries and Laarman [63] described another case of this disease in a Guinana dolphin. Interestingly, no other cetaceans other than dolphins have ever been reported with this disease [59, 60]. It is generally accepted that the disease is the consequence of injuries sustained by the animal [61], and can therefore be transmitted to humans during necropsies [58]. It presents itself as white, elevated, crusty, nodular lesions on the animal's body [59-61], although mainly on the head, flippers, abdomen, fins, back tail stocks and flukes [60]. On cellular level, the disease presents with superficial granulomatous dermatitis, associated with macrophages and multinucleated giant cells containing a variety of round yeast cells [61]. More cases of this disease affecting cetaceans have been added to the list and recently some authors suggested that the incidence of lobomycosis might represent opportunistic infections in immuno-compromised hosts [62, 65]. The bio-accumulation of environmental contaminants in the affected dolphins was thought to possibly contribute to susceptibility to this disease [62].
